Computer systems located within a specific local geographic region (e.g., an office, building floor, building, home, or any other defined indoor and/or outdoor geographic region) are typically interconnected using a Local Area Network (LAN) (e.g., the Ethernet). The LANs, in turn, can be interconnected with each other using a Wide Area Network (WAN) (e.g., the Internet). A conventional LAN can be deployed using an Ethernet-based infrastructure comprising cables, hubs switches, and other elements. Connection ports (e.g., Ethernet ports) can be used to couple multiple computer systems to the LAN. For example, a user can connect to the LAN by physically attaching a computing device (e.g., a laptop, desktop, or handheld computer) to one of the connection ports using physical wires or cables. Other types of computer systems, such as database computers, server computers, routers, and Internet gateways, can be connected to the LAN in a similar manner. Once physically connected to the LAN, a variety of services can be accessed and/or provided by these computers (e.g., file transfer, remote login, email, WWW, database access, and voice over IP).
Using recent (and increasingly popular) wireless technologies, users can now be wirelessly connected to the computer network. Thus, wireless communication can provide wireless access to a LAN in the office, home, public hot-spot, and other geographical locations.
The IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are known as Wireless Local Area Network, WLAN or WiFi, are popular for such wireless communication. One recent standard for wireless communication is 802.11ai, which employs a security state machine to facilitate authentications and associations.